Daminien Pearse: Iran Can Make Nuclear Weapons, But Won't!A

This statement is the first time an Iranian politician has admitted his country has the capability to produce nuclear arms! Iran has the technological capability to produce nuclear weapons, but will never do so, a prominent politician in the Islamic republic has said. The statement by Gholamreza Mesbahi Moghadam is the first time an Iranian politician has publicly stated that the country has the knowledge and skills to produce a nuclear weapon. Moghadam, whose views do not represent the government's policy, said Iran could easily create the highly enriched uranium that is used to build atomic bombs, but it was not Tehran's policy to go down that route. Moghadam told the parliament's news website, icana.ir: "Iran has the scientific and technological capability to produce a nuclear weapon, but will never choose this path." The US and its allies believe Iran is using its civilian nuclear program as a cover to develop nuclear weapons, a charge it denies. Israel said Mghadam's claim supported its view that Iran's nuclear program had a military dimension. An Israeli official repeated demands that Iran must stop enriching uranium, remove all military-grade enriched material from the country, and dismantle its Fordo nuclear research site. Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has repeatedly insisted that his country is not seeking nuclear weapons, saying that holding such arms is a sin and "useless, harmful and dangerous". President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said that if Iran one day decides to build nuclear weapons, it will do so openly and without fear. Iran says it is enriching uranium to about 3.5% to produce nuclear fuel for its future reactors, and to around 20% to fuel a research reactor that produces medical isotopes to treat cancer. Uranium has to be enriched to more than 90% to be used for a nuclear weapon. 

Tomgram: How You Subsidize the Energy Giants!

Just in case you're running for national office, here are a few basic stats to orient you when you hit Washington. In 2011, the oil and gas industries ponied up more than $148 million to lobby Congress and federal agencies of various sorts. The top four lobbying firms in the business were Conoco-Phillips with $20.5 million, Royal Dutch Shell with $14.7 million, Exxon Mobil with $12.7 million, and Chevron, with $9.5 million. Note that those figures don't include campaign contributions, although I can't imagine why corporate money flowing to candidates or their PACs isn't considered "lobbying." When it comes to such donations, the industry has given a total of $238.7 million to candidates and parties since 1990, 75% of it to Republicans. In 2011-2012, Exxon $992,573 and, I'm sure this won't shock you, Koch Industries $872,912 led the oil and gas list. Or think of this another way: the Senate recently voted down a bill sponsored by New Jersey Senator Robert Menendez to end congressional subsidies for the top oil companies. The senators who nixed the measure, led by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY, $264,700), received approximately $1.48 million in oil and gas campaign contributions in 2011-2012. Those who voted for it, a mere $400,000. Not surprisingly, this fits a longer-term congressional voting pattern in which money talks. In fact, it shouts. And of course, a similar pattern can be seen in the presidential sweepstakes, with a similar Republican to Democrat ratio. In the present election campaign, Mitt Romney has already received $598,000 from oil and gas types, President Obama $131,000.       

Ron Paul: The Supreme Court and Obamacare?

Last week the Supreme Court heard arguments concerning the constitutionality of the Obama-care law, focusing on the mandate requiring every American to buy health insurance or pay fines enforced by the IRS. Hopefully, the Court will strike down this abomination, but we must recognize that the federal judiciary has an abysmal record when it comes to protecting liberty. It's doubtful the entire law will be struck down. Regardless, the political left will continue its drive toward a single-payer, government run health care system. The insurance mandate clearly exceeds the federal government's power under the interstate commerce clause found in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution. This is patently obvious: The power to regulate commerce cannot include the power to compel commerce! Those who claim otherwise simply ignore the plain meaning of the Constitution, because they don't want to limit federal power in any way. The commerce clause was intended simply to give Congress the power to regulate foreign trade, and also to prevent states from imposing tariffs on interstate goods. In Federalist Paper No.22, Alexander Hamilton makes it clear the simple intent behind the clause was to prevent states from placing tolls or tariffs on goods as they passed through each state, a practice that had proven particularly destructive across the many principalities of the German empire. But the Supreme Court has utterly abused the commerce clause for decades, at least since the infamous 1942 case of Wickard v. Filburn. In that instance the Court decided that a farmer growing wheat for purely personal use still affected interstate commerce, presuming by not participating in it!

PRESSTV: Iranian Crude Oil has Myriad Customers

Iran's oil minister says that despite Western oil sanctions, Iranian crude continues to have many customers worldwide. "Iran has 17-20 percent of its oil reserves and ranks first in the world in terms of oil and gas resources," Rostam Qasemi told a meeting of Mazandaran Province's Planning and Development Council on Thursday. The minister added that the US and European oil and gas reserves pale by comparison to Iran's. "We have 600 billion barrels of in-place oil. If they are extracted using the current method, Iran will be rich in oil resources for the next 100 years," he said. Qasemi stated that Iran produced about 700 million cubic meters of gas last year, supplying gas to 99 percent of cities and 57 percent of villages in Iran. Pointing to Iran's second rank among OPEC oil producers, the minister added that the Islamic Republic is now a major exporter of petroleum products to Iraq and Afghanistan, and soon to Pakistan. Qasemi noted that Iran is exporting 55 million cubic meters of petrochemical products to 70 countries, and that many parts of Iran have not been explored for oil and gas reserves yet. Referring to the ongoing gas exploration and production in the South Pars region, he added that the total amount of gas refined in the South Pars Energy Zone is expected to hit 800 million cubic meters by 2015. Qasemi stated that the Iranian oil industry is not dependent on foreign technology and technical know-how, and that the Iranian specialists are conducting the complicated studies on hydrocarbon reservoirs. Since the beginning of 2012, the US and the European Union have imposed new sanctions on Iran, aimed at penalizing other countries for importing Iranian crude.    

Bryan A. Burchill: Iran: The Terrorism Trump Card!

The UK's Guardian recently interviewed "the current and former US and European officials with access to intelligence on Iran," and concluded that the United States, its European allies, and even Israel, agree that Tehran is probably years away from having a deliverable nuclear warhead. Twice in recent weeks, CBC News anchor Peter Mansbridge has closely questioned two leaders who hold a different view. In a January 18th interview, Prime Minister Stephen Harper told Mansbridge that he thinks that "the evidence is overwhelming" and that it "is just beyond dispute at this point" that Iran's purpose is to develop nuclear weapons. When pressed about Iran's insistence that Iran has no intention to build nuclear weapons, Harper said "I think there is absolutely no doubt they are lying". Harper's claims are all-too-reminiscent of US Former Secretary of State Colin Powell's February, 2003 statement to the UN that, with "facts and conclusions based on solid intelligence", there was no doubt in his mind that Saddam Hussein was working to obtain key components to produce nuclear weapons. That intelligence has since been exposed as lies. In fact, the Iraqi chemical engineer who perpetrated the false intelligence, Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi, confessed his lies on British television April 3rd. Also troubling is that Harper cited the International Atomic Energy Commission, but in the March 22nd Guardian, the agency's former director-general, Hans Blix, raised concerns about its recent credibility. The IAEC has been charged with over-reliance on unverified intelligence, and pro-Western bias, since the 2009 arrival of its new Chief, Yukiya Amano.    

Michel Chossudovsky: The F-35 Stealth Fighter Program and the War Economy

There is mounting controversy regarding the purchase of the F-35 stealth fighter jet from US defense giant Lockheed Martin. The Pentagon has commissioned the purchase of 2,443 aircraft "to provide the bulk of its tactical air-power for the US Air Force, Marine Corps and Navy over the coming decades". This massive procurement of advanced weapons systems is part of America's "Global War", largely directed against China, Russia, North Korea and Iran. The overall cost of the program to the US military is estimated at a staggering $1.51 trillion over the so called life cycle of the program, namely $618 million per plane. Several of America's close allies, including the UK, Australia, Italy, Canada, the Netherlands, Norway, Turkey, Israel, and Japan are slated to purchase the F-35 stealth fighter plane. The economic and social implications of this program are potentially devastating. Apart from the fact that the fighter planes will be used in upcoming US-NATO wars, resulting in inevitable civilian deaths, their procurement, at tax payers expense, will contribute to exacerbating the ongoing fiscal crisis. Unless they are solely funded by an increase in the public debt (which is highly unlikely), these massive expenditures on advanced weapons systems will require the adoption of concurrent austerity measures over a period of up to thirty years, at the expense of an entire generation. The costs of military procurement are always at the expense of social programs, public investment in infrastructure, employment creation in the civilian economy. Conversely, very few jobs will be created by the defense contractors. The cost of creating one job in America's weapons industry varies between 25 and 66 million dollars per job!

Felicity Arbuthnot: Afghanistan, A Tale of "Three Tragedies"

March was another month of tragic, needless lives lost, the searing grief of mothers and fathers for lost sons and daughters. Shockingly stark, however, has been the impression, that for the powers-that-be, for a swathe of public in the West, some deaths are indisputedly regarded as, more tragic, more noteworthy, than others. On 6th March, six British soldiers were killed in Afghanistan. Corporal Jake Hartley (20) and Privates Anthony Frampton (20) Christopher Kershaw (19) Daniel Wade (20) and Daniel Wade (20) and Daniel Wilford (20) and Sergeant Nigel Coupe (33) died when their armored vehicle was blown up. The resulting fire reportedly burned all night. More youthful annihilations in an invasion and occupation, illegal, ill-conceived and long lost. Human sacrifices at the altar of political ego, dying because the powerful would still lose, throw away, the lives of others, than"lose face" "one hundred and twenty five months since the "war" started. In the US, five of the six would have been too young to even legally order a drink in a bar, but are old enough to die for monumental imperial folly, regional foothold" and a pipeline. Before the month ended, two more British servicemen were shot, and yet another, blown to eternity. In Parliament Prime Minister Cameron paid vacuous tribute. They died, he said: "Keeping our country safe." What nonsense. There are no Afghan hordes massing across the English Channel, planning invasion with near antique rifles, some so ancient they have Queen Victoria's insignia on, relics from another historic British folly. Prince Harry, cavorting round the Caribbean, filling in time before returning to Afghanistan in an Apache Attack Helicopter, with fire power of 632 rounds a minute, plus up to sixteen Hellfire missiles, to wipe out more villagers, and their homes, hung his head and declared himself: "Devastated."